Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an estimate of the number of children who previously received but are no longer eligible for free school meals as a result of their households reaching a net earned income threshold of £7,400 per annum under Universal Credit at the point of claim as of 9 January 2024; and whether her Department holds data on families with multiple children in which one or more child qualifies for free school meals but not the others.

This government has extended eligibility for free school meals (FSM) several times and to more groups of children than any other government over the past half a century, most notably through the introduction of universal infant free school meals (UIFSM) FSM in 2014. The result of this is that over a third of pupils in England now receive free meals, compared with one in six in 2010.

The department monitors data on the number of pupils who are eligible for FSM, including estimates for future years, but no formal assessment has been made on the number of children eligible for FSM in 2024 and 2025. The department publishes statistics annually which show that over 2 million pupils are currently eligible for FSM. This is an increase from 1.1 million eligible pupils in 2018, when extensive transitional protections were first introduced.

Protections ensure that children in receipt of FSM will not lose access to this entitlement until at least March 2025, even if their household’s financial circumstances improve. The department does not plan to formally assess the number of children who would no longer be eligible for FSM, in the absence of the protections policy.

The department has always been clear that a child is only eligible for FSM if their family meets the eligibility criteria at the point of applying for FSM. The result may be that in some cases for children in the same household, some may be eligible for FSM whilst others are not. The department does not plan to make an estimate of this figure.

Further information is available at: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-pupils-and-their-characteristics#dataBlock-2f5a67c4-6e66-414a-a926-f959d8b6443a-tables.